


Sea-Change

by littledust



Category: The Tempest - Shakespeare
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-24
Updated: 2009-12-24
Packaged: 2017-10-05 05:30:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/38290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littledust/pseuds/littledust
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three moments by the ocean.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sea-Change

**Author's Note:**

  * For [genarti](https://archiveofourown.org/users/genarti/gifts).



Soft is the sound of footfalls on sand, the counterpoint to the hushed roar of the ocean. Miranda runs with arms outstretched, pretending that she has wings. Pretense becomes the illusion of reality: she skims along the surface of the tide, soaring on wings a bare white shimmer in the air. She is more fairy than gull, this girl.

Prospero watches his daughter in his mind's eye, hears the bubble of her laughter. He is the only inhabitant at the island who might wonder at the sudden flight of a child, yet he wonders the least of all. Miranda is his daughter; this is his island; of course she may indulge in her own small whims. It is nothing much to set a girl adrift.

The sprite, Ariel, gambols alongside her. Satisfied, Prospero returns to his work.

*

Spray and salt linger on Ariel's lips, just corporeal enough to catch some of the flavor. Ariel longs for the cool sweetness of morning dew, but the ocean, wild as it is, still feels homelike enough. Prospero desires a fall of rain, and so it falls to Ariel to change the winds and stir the seas. It is exhilarating, this work, but the spectacle is empty, meant for an audience of only one.

The girl, Miranda, will not enjoy the rain. She is not allowed to play by the water except in fair weather.

The thought gives Ariel pause, causes a swift transformation. Male-shaped, substantial enough to see with the naked eye, he rests his heels on the water's surface and holds the western breeze in the palm of his hand. Were he free, he would allow the girl her amusements.

But he is not free.

*

Miranda thrills for the journey, every nerve bared to the sea breeze. She does not heed the sailors' warning that leaning over the side is dangerous. If she falls, the wind will catch her, as it always has. Ferdinand kisses her cheek and tells her that things are not the same away from the island, but Miranda cannot believe that this brave new world has no magic lingering in its glittering aspect.

The magician, Prospero, is magician no more--yet he is still more than her father. Miranda knows not what a Duke of Milan does, despite her education. Words on the page do not spring to life if she has no image to accompany her thoughts.

The gulls keen fond farewell and Miranda imagines that she hears Ariel's voice as well, that quicksilver timbre belonging to neither man nor woman. She misses Ariel when Ferdinand is near, precisely because his presence is so physical, his touch so heavy and lingering. It thrills her to the core, but it is strange to a girl accustomed to illusion. Reality is an expression of iron, weighty and definite.

Water is a reassuring element. Miranda laughs as a wave curls around her outstretched fingers, the touch gentle as what she imagines a mother's must feel like. She resolves not to suffer for her sea-changes; they are inevitable and yet exciting.

When Ferdinand passes by, she challenges him to a game of chess.


End file.
